Olympics Nails #2

So I wasn't too sure how the Opening Ceremony would turn out but I thought it was FREAKIN' AMAZING!!! Good job all round! So... going from a Doubting Thomas to a Keeno Chris (OK, so I may have made this last one up) this post is dedicated to the London Opening Ceremony!!!


Dee is currently actually working at the games and for some CRAZY reason the staff aren't allowed to wear nail varnish, so I'm taking the reins at the moment! Hope you like!

Thumb: Olympic Rings

1) Paint on a white background
2) Get a blue, black, red, yellow and green nail art pen and paint on small circular rings (unfortunately mine went a bit wonky!)
3) To finish off, I added '2012' at the bottom


Index Finger: Poppy Field

1) Paint on a pale blue background for the sky
2) Using a dark green nail varnish and a sponge, apply a layer of dark green on to the top half of your nail
3) Do the same with light green
4) Using the 2 green shades, draw a few vertical lines for more prominent blades of grass
5) Paint on a few red blobs
6) Add black dots to the centre of a couple of the blobs


Middle Finger: The Olympic Torch

1) Using a gold nail varnish, paint on a tilted rectangle at the top of your nail
2) Use red, orange and yellow nail art pens to create the fire
3) Using a brown nail art pen, paint on the outline detail of the torch


Ring Finger: Mary Poppins!

1) Use a sponge to apply the twilight background with dark blue and purple
2) VERY CAREFULLY paint on a Mary Poppins silhouette! Don't forget her trademark umbrella and bag!


Pinky: Union Jack

1) Paint a white background
2) Using a red nail art pen paint on the cross 
3) Using a dark blue paint on the extra little bits
Apologies for how messy this nail is! I found my pinky just too small!

What do you think? Have you guys noticed all the Olympic-themed nail art that a lot of the female athletes are sporting? Which have been your favourite?

Graduation Nails...

A few days ago both me and Hannah graduated from Nottingham Uni, an emotional and epic day for all! It has been a wonderful 3 years for both of us, and now we're officially adults in the world, thinks are getting serious! However, we refuse to neglect our duties in the nail art department and in true HanDee style, I decided to do some graduation nails to top the standard manicure...

Apologies for the bad quality of the first photo, and the chipped nail in the second! You can't win 'em all! Anyway, all I did here was to paint a base of nude nail polish, paint the tips with white, use a black nail art pen to draw and fill the hat before highlighting the edges with white, and use a white nail art pen to draw the scroll before highlighting the edges with black. You might need an extra steady hand to do this but it isn't as hard as you think and well worth the reaction! 

What do you think?

A Tessellating Design!

Hi guys! Here are some Tetris nails that I hope brighten up your Monday!

This design is really simple and doesn't take that long to do as the nail varnish dries very quickly! I decided to go with the standard Tetris colours, looked up the shapes and then went crazy with the order! Just start at the top of your nail and work towards the base slotting in the shapes as if you were playing Tetris! Make sure you paint on the individual squares of each shape so they look like real Tetris pieces. Then finish off with a cover coat of course! 

What do you think? What's everyone wearing on their nails at the moment?

G-G-G-GRADUATION BALL!

So here at HanDee we have come to the end of our university experience. It's been an amazing 3 years all leading up to our Graduation Ball (and ceremony, though this is a lot less glamorous!). Though the Ball was slightly less than expected, the initial girly getting-ready session of hair, false lashes, make-up and all that jazz was loads of fun! The highlight of the whole period being the painting of the nails of course!

So here are the nails I had for the big day!

Just a simple manicure to go with a simple and (hopefully!) elegant look! All you need are white and a pink nail art pens and a clear cover coat. Paint the tip of your nail white - they'll need to be long for this to be most effective! And then paint on a star shape to the right of the top of your nail again in white. Use the white nail art pen to then paint on small dots next to the stars. Once all the white is nearly dry but a little tacky, paint on your pink detail inside the star blending with the white a little and finish off with a clear cover coat! Beautiful!

This nail art was so simple and easy to do, perfect for a classy occasion or even when you want to spice up your nails but don't want to go too over-the-top!

Hope you like!

31 Day Nail Art Challenge - Day 30

The penultimate day guys! Here's Day 30 - Inspired by a Tutorial


Having had some quite disturbing nail art on yesterday, I wanted something much cuter to look at so I chose to base this day's nail design on a VERY cute owl tutorial by cutepolish! 


Check it out here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SD-_iMqKZ5Y

Here's what I came up with:

How cute are these?! Decided to spice things up with an owl on each nail rather than just the one like cutepolish. I'm also a big big fan of colour so went for different colours too!


Hope you guys like!

HanDee

xx

31 Day Nail Art Challenge - Day 29

Ok, so if the last post was long, this one is CRAZY long! So now it's Day 29 - Inspired by the Supernatural!

Now it was back to my childhood with these nails and I loved every minute down memory lane! As it's nowhere near Halloween I tried to make the nails as anti-Halloweeny as possible while sticking with the theme so here are Scooby-Doo nails!


I decided to alternate Scooby gang and villain on my nails to make it more interesting! Some of these were pretty darn tricky (so be prepared for some time-consuming work!) but on the whole I hope they came out alright! 

Left hand:

Thumb: Scooby-Doo logo

1) Paint on a pale blue background

2) Using a bright yellow, paint on an 'S' and a 'D'

3) Use a black nail art pen to do an outline!

Index Finger: Fred

1) Using a black nail art pen, draw the outline of Freddie's head - I started with an oval shape then drew the hair outline

2) So once that's done, fill in the hair with a nice pale yellow

3) If you fancy/have enough room, add some collar detail in pail blue

4) Finally add facial deets: eyes, eyebrows, nose and a mouth! Here I tried to add teeth but they didn't come out too well!

Middle Finger: The Ghost Clown

1) Start off with a white oval base for the clown's face paint - once dry, follow this with the black details: hat, triangle-shaped eyes and the outline of the mouth

2) Move on to filling in some detail now - the nose (which I forgot to do an early outline of) and mouth with a pinky colour

3) Using a bright yellow, fill in an area of the eyes making sure to leave a black outline

4) Add the bright red hair under the cap

Ring Finger: Daphne

1) Similarly to Fred, use a black nail art pen to do the facial outline - an oval shape again and then her voluminous hair! For Daphne though remember to do an outline of her signature purple headband!

2) Fill in the hair with an orange

3) Paint on the headband

4) Add facial detail - eyes (the flicks here are supposed to be eyelashes), nose, and girly lips (I tried to fill in some detail for lipstick but it sort of smudged making her seem very moody!)

Pinky: Charlie the Funland Robot

1) Add the head outline - a sort of helmet and chin strap

2) Add black filled-in circles for the eyes

3) Fill in the detail of the robot helmet thingy

4) Use a yellow pen to give the eyes that eerie glow!

Right hand:

Thumb: Scooby-Doo 

1) Again, you need a black outline for Scooby's head. Miraculously, I did this on my first try! Start with a thick-ish neck shape, add two small ears and finish with his muzzle, filling in his nose 
2) Using a brown, fill in Scooby's head!
3) Using a pink paint the inside of the ear, and using the black, add a few dots by his nose
4) Finish off with his eyes: paint on small white ovals. Once dry paint on the black pupils. Finish off with some eyebrows!


Index Finger: The Creeper

1) Paint on a pale green base for the face - but in a short of skull shape as his head isn't oval. Also add the reddy-brown hair
2) Using a black, add the outlines of the hair, and face. Add a couple of black lines for cheek detail. Also, using a pale yellow, add two small ovals for the Creeper's eyes
3) Back to black with this step: add the pupils to the eyes, the eyebrows and a small round filled-in circle for the mouth
4) Finish off with some detail for his bizarrely square shoulders in dark green!


Middle Finger: Shaggy

Only three easy steps this time!
1) Firstly paint on the outline for the head and hair (I didn't really space Shaggy out enough here so his face is a little squished and doesn't have room for his funny little goatee stubble)
2) Add a gold or dark yellow for his hair
3) Using a black add his eyes, nose, eyebrows and mouth


Ring Finger: The Ghost of Captain Cutler

1) Using a pale yellow, paint on a round head with a small bit jutting out at the top
2) Using a silver or grey paint, add the detail around the of his old school diving suit. Also, using a light blue, paint on the little window of the suit
3) Finish of with a silver or grey outline around the window, and then some seaweed hanging off his head


Pinky: Velma

Aka 'The Fly' 
1) Now this one is easily the worst with the pinky nail being too tiny to paint a proper face on! Start again with an outline in black - Velma's is pretty similar to Shaggy's
2) Fill in her dark red hair
3) Add the details of her mouth and glasses
4) As all the black details were running together I painted the glass in Velma's frames a light blue then added black pupils - making her look like a little fly

As you can see, I had a little trouble with facial detail - especially on Velma! Definitely something to work on in the future!


ONLY TWO DAYS LEFT OF THE CHALLENGE!!!

HanDee

xx

31 Day Nail Art Challenge - Day 28

So Day 28 is Inspired by a Flag. Rather than be repetitive I decided to do 10 different flags of the top 10 countries I'd like to visit!


All these nails are easy as pie really, just simple backgrounds and a steady hand for some detail!


Left Hand:

Thumb: Guyana

1) Dark green background

2) Paint on a yellow isosceles (haven't said that since GCSE!) triangle

3) Paint a smaller red triangle at the base of your nail inside the yellow

4) Add a white outline to the yellow triangle, and a black one to the red triangle... and done! Nice, bright and easy!

Index Finger: China

1) Paint on a red background
2) Using a yellow, paint a large star at the bottom left of your nail, then four smaller stars around it - I only painted dots for the smaller stars as the brush was a little too big!


Middle Finger: Egypt

1) Paint on a white background

2) Paint a black strip at the bottom of the flag

3) Now paint a red one at the top

4) Now the Eagle (of Saladin) was very tricky! On my nail it just sort of looks like a golden blob, but you get the gist!

Ring Finger: New Zealand

1) Use a blue for the flag background

2) Paint on some red stars to the right of the flag (again mine just look like blobs I'm afraid!)

3) Paint a mini Union Jack flag in the top left-hand side of the flag: paint a small red cross first, then use a white for the diagonal stripes on the flag

Pinky: Italy

1) Paint on a white background

2) Paint a green stripe at the bottom of your nail

3) Finally paint on a red stripe at the top!

Right Hand: 

Thumb: USA

1) Paint a white background

2) Paint a blue square at the top right-hand corner of your nail

3) Add some small white stars (dots!) on the blue 

4) Finish off with the stripes!

Index Finger: India

1) Paint on your white background (yet again!)

2) Paint on an orange stripe at the top of your flag

3) Paint a parallel green stripe at the bottom

4) Add the Ashok Chakra (24-spoke wheel) in the middle in blue - I tried so very hard to try to make the wheel work but it became a blob again!

Middle Finger: Brazil

1) Paint on your green background

2) Paint on a yellow diamond shape

3) Add a blue filled-in circle in the middle of the diamond

4) Finish off with a white band diagonally over the blue

Ring Finger: Greece

1) Another white background!

2) Paint on a blue small square on the top left of the flag

3) Paint on some blue stripes

4) Finish off with the white cross on the blue square

Pinky: Japan

1) Ok, so last nail and last white base coat!

2) Then add your red dot in the middle! Easiest flag ever!

Apologies for the lengthy post!!

HanDee

xx

31 Day Nail Art Challenge - Day 26

Time for  Day 26 - Inspired by a Pattern!

I wasn't too sure what to do for this, but fancied something multi-coloured, as it just brightens everything up don't you think? Here's what I settled on:

Now our version is a little different, mainly because I didn't space the crosses out, but still looks quite groovy we think!

So, all you need to do is...

1) Paint on a background - a neutral one is best

2) Starting at the base of your nail, paint on a few red crosses

3) Carry on painting crosses of the other colours, trying to space them out evenly, and slotting them together like a puzzle really

4) Apply your top coat

Only a few days left of the challenge!!!

HanDee 

xx

31 Day Nail Art Challenge - Day 25

Here's Day 25 - Inspired by Fashion...


Now I don't know all that much about what's 'on trend', so decided to have a look through Vogue pics for anything funky that caught my eye, and here's what I found!

This outfit is from the Vogue Spring/Summer 2012 Trends Collection: 'Decorative Day'. This comes from the brilliant Louis Vuitton! Decided to use this pattern as inspiration for my nails as it's nice and light and pastels seem perfect for the sun!

Here's my interpretation (apologies for how messy it is!)

Pretty simple really guys!

1) Start off with a white base coat

2) Using a pastel green and a sponge, apply a light layer of green over the majority of your nail, leaving the area by the cuticle bare

3) For the small flowers, paint 5 small dots in a circular pattern

4) When dry, add a silver centre to the flowers

HanDee

xx

31 Day Nail Art Challenge - Day 24

So it's been a while since the last post, but university work should occasionally take priority over nails!

Here's Day 24 - Inspired by a Book!

I don't know why but for this challenge I chose Lord of the Flies. Not quite as feel-good and cheerful as Disney, but I thought it would be a great subject! For those of you who have read Lord of the Flies these nails hopefully explain themselves! Otherwise we hope you enjoy!

Thumb: The book's front cover

This nail is easy as pie really! Just have to have a fairly steady hand for the lettering!

1) Paint on a bright orange base coat

2) Using a yellow varnish, paint on the title - be careful to space it out properly (as I had a bit of trouble as you can see!)

3) Using a blue, paint on the snake to the left of the nail

Index Finger: Piggy!

If you have read the book, you'll know Piggy (though not a real pig) is a pretty major (and annoying) character!
1) Using a pink nail varnish, paint the bottom half of your nail, curving it slightly
2) Add the pink ears! (Much easier if you do this separately to the head to prevent any varnish spreading)
3) Using a white, paint on two circles for eyes
4) Use black outline for the rest!


Middle Finger: A desert island

The setting of the book, where it all hits the fan...
1) Using a pale (sky) blue, your whole nail
2) Use a darker blue for the sea over half of your nail
3) Using a yellow, paint on the island shape
4) Paint a tree-trunk for your palm tree
5) Paint on the leaves with a dark green!
And there you have your desert island paradise!

Ring Finger: Fire

If I remember back to the days of GCSE English, fire symbolism was VERY important in the book, so I decided to paint on the signal fire the boys make!
1) Paint on a sky blue base
2) Using a red, paint on various flame shapes
3) Once dry, use an orange over the top
4) Throw on a bit of yellow too!
5) Add the smoke!


Pinky: The conch

This is SUPPOSED to be a conch (one of those large shells you can hear the ocean in), but looks more like a peachy, pinky brown blob... I tried!
1) Paint a base coat of any colour really - white just seemed best
2) Using a light brown, paint a triangular blob on with a few sticky-outy bits
3) Use a dark brown outline for that 3D effect
3) Use a pink to draw a line indicating the inside of the shell!

What do you think? (Maybe give the last nail a miss!)

HanDee 


xx